Stamp: Hurling becoming a game for sissies

WEXFORD star Darren Stamp has launched a blistering attack on GAA disciplinary chiefs – accusing them of taking the “manliness” out of hurling and edging it towards “a sissies’ game”.

The 30-year-old Oulart-the-Ballagh clubman is fearful for the future of the sport due to rules and regulations around tackling in particular.

Stamp blasted: “These men in Croke Park are a crowd of eejits – they haven’t a clue. They’re sitting down every couple of years making up stupid rules that are killing hurling. A lad might be trying to take the ball off a fella by flicking it away but a tip on the hand or hurl is a yellow card. You don’t see big tackles or shoulders anymore. You’re afraid of your life going into a tackle for fear of getting a yellow card,” he said.

“You can’t hit a lad a shoulder any more (because if you do) it’s a free. The 50-50 shoulder has gone out the window. It’s nearly a sissies’ game, a bit like soccer. The manliness is gone out of it.”

Stamp also slammed critics of the Wexford team, admitting that constant sniping impacted on team morale during the league.

He said: “We’ve been taking hits off everyone. There are gobs****s on The Sunday Game making little of us for the last two years. It’s easy for them lads up there getting paid. They’re not going up for the good of their health.

“They’re getting paid for criticising us. You try not to let if affect you but it does drag you down and seeing these lads, some of them laughing at you, turns your stomach.

“Everybody wrote us off but the draw in Thurles felt like a win. They had a chance with the last puck of the game.

“I knew the draw would keep us up; I couldn’t see Offaly beating Kilkenny in Nowlan Park.”

Stamp added: “I feel sorry for Offaly. Last year Offaly had two of the best games of the year against Galway and pushed them really hard. They’ve struggled with injuries this year and the GAA needs to look at them going down to Division Two big time. But there are lads in Croke Park with nothing to do, coming up with bulls**t rules.”

Stamp’s Oulart-the-Ballagh clubmate Liam Dunne, a former All-Ireland SHC medallist with the Model County, warned recently that Wexford were destined for Christy Ring hurling if standards didn’t improve.

And Stamp reflected: “Liam speaks his mind. It was in the paper but as Colm Bonnar says, the paper will take ink. Liam would be the best in the world – a true hurling man and a true Wexford man. He was concerned like everyone was but there are a lot of young lads out there who don’t want to hurl for Wexford because we were going so bad. Maybe those guys might think differently now.”

Stamp revealed he turned down offers of work in London to remain hurling with Wexford: “I’ve been offered a job in London. I could start this morning or any morning but I’d have to go over there and hurl with Fr. Murphys. There is work over but I don’t think I’ll go. I can’t go. I’m building a house and it would mean leaving my fiancée Elaine at home. You’d be talking about going over on a Sunday evening and home on a Friday. I’ve been pouring concrete since leaving school at 17 or 18. But I’d turn my hand to anything.”